Trademark
Anything that identifies the source of your goods or services.
Most often a name or logo, but it can be a sound, colour or shape. The legal function is to tell buyers where something comes from. A trademark protects that identifier - not your product, your idea, or your written content.
Why it matters to your application
Worth being precise about, because the single most common misunderstanding in brand protection is what a trademark actually covers. It protects the thing that identifies you as the source - the name, the logo, sometimes a sound or colour. It does not protect your product, your idea, your content or your business model.
In order
- Separate what you want to protect: a name or logo is a trademark, an invention is a patent, written or visual content is copyright.
- Identify the identifiers worth owning: usually the brand name first, then the logo, then any distinctive sub-brand.
- Check availability before committing, across the register and beyond it.
- File for the name before the logo if budget is limited. Logos change; names rarely do.
How this plays out
A founder registers a logo and assumes the brand is protected. A competitor adopts the same name with a different logo. The registration covers the design that changed, not the word that mattered.
About trademark
What is the difference between a trademark and a copyright?
A trademark protects identifiers of source - names, logos. Copyright protects original creative work such as text, images and music. They are separate systems and often both apply.
Should I register my name or my logo?
Usually the name first. It is broader, it survives rebrands, and a word mark protects the name however it is styled.
Can I trademark a colour or a sound?
In principle yes, but it is considerably harder and normally requires evidence that consumers already recognise it as yours.
General information about USPTO procedure, not legal advice about your situation. Always confirm the status and deadlines on your own application in USPTO TSDR.
Others you will meet at this stage
Common law rights
Rights you get from using a name, without registering it.
Choosing a nameDead mark
A record that is abandoned, cancelled or expired.
Choosing a nameDescriptive mark
A name that describes what you sell. Hard to register.
Choosing a nameDistinctiveness
How strongly a name works as a brand rather than a description.
Choosing a name